Notes ·
The invitations are printed
Eighty-four cards, white ink on dark cotton, printed one at a time on a treadle press in a barn outside Frome. They are in the post this week.
They took two days, and the second day was entirely the monogram.
The cards are letterpress: the type is set in metal, locked into a chase, and the press closes on the sheet along a single line. Above that line the page is still just paper. Below it, it is printed — and there is no undoing it, which is the part we liked.
Why white ink
Opaque white on a dark stock is the one combination where you can see the impression itself. The bite catches the light before the ink does, so at the right angle you read the card twice: once as a shadow, once as a word.
It also means the monogram is blind — pulled from a plate with no ink on it at all. It takes the same pressure as everything else and has nothing to show for it but the dent. It is at the bottom of every card, and at the bottom of every page on this site.
If yours has not arrived
Post being post, a few will go astray. Everything on the card is on this site, so nothing is lost; but tell us anyway and we will send another, because we have eleven spare and no other use for them.